As one of the world?s largest multichannel retailers, HSN is making a hard push into mobile to not only drive sales, but also reach shoppers with tailored, personalized deals based on the company?s broad amount of data on consumers.

This holiday season, HSN is honing in on email and paid search as key drivers in getting consumers to the brand?s mobile properties. From there, the goal is to get consumers to download HSN?s application, which the company sees as a loyalty-driving platform.

?I think we?re going to see a huge number of new customers come through mobile to complete their transactions during the holiday season,? said Bill Brand, chief marketing officer of HSN, St. Petersburg, FL.

?The opportunity to build a relationship with her is, 'At what point do we get her to embrace the app?' ? that will usually not happen on the first purchase, that?s a real loyalty-driver ? and at the right time message her appropriately to engage with the app, and we will most likely be using email marketing to do that,? he said.

In an exclusive interview with Mobile Marketer, Mr. Brand weighs in on how HSN is crafting a mobile strategy around both commerce and entertainment that is tailored towards multi-platform shoppers.

Which mobile tactics are most successful for HSN?
What we do is design all of our emails ? we?ve actually gone through a complete redesign of our email program ? to make it mobile-first and mobile-friendly.

As we all know, mobile will eventually be the majority of [email] opens, so even how we display products, we?ve changed over the last month to make them easier to access through mobile. The layouts have all been adjusted to make them more easy to browse.

As we?re learning how these customers are interacting on individual platforms, we?re able to segment, personalize and market to them as individuals versus a one-size-fits-all, and that?s the beauty that we?re able to utilize because of that extensive database and extensive analytics that we have around our customer.

Which mobile channels are you investing in most leading up to the holidays?
In terms of fourth-quarter, we actually kicked off our holiday season on Oct. 4, and our gift store at HSN.com and on the HSN mobile platforms are open and are driving business already. We based our gift stores on trends and strategies from last year that worked and learned from those, so we?re out there and will have an aggressive season.

But again, it?s about creating long-term relationships with her, and we know that gift giving is an important time of the year for her, and we?ll have a robust marketing campaign that just kicked off and definitely, obviously, includes mobile.

We don?t break out our marketing spend by channel, we bring it all together. We look at email and paid search as key drivers to our mobile platforms and measure against that. Those are key, we see great conversion and SEO, SEM all playing a role in showing promising conversion at this point.

I think we?re going to see a huge number of new customers come through mobile to complete their transactions during the holiday season. The opportunity to build a relationship with her is, 'At what point do we get her to embrace the app' ? that will usually not happen on the first purchase, that?s a real loyalty-driver ? and at the right time message her appropriately to engage with  the app, and we will most likely be using email marketing to do that.

How much of a role is mobile playing in HSN?s marketing right now?
In terms of the role that it plays, it?s now a key platform for us ? it is our leading channel of growth in terms of the business, and it is something that we are completely focused on.

We have a complete mobile-first strategy to be sure that all of the assets we create, all of the experiences that we create have a mobile element to them and that there is an amazing experience on the mobile platforms.

It just means that if we?re crafting video, if we?re crafting graphics, if we?re crafting emails that each one of them is done through a mobile lens, so they are responsive to the platforms. So as you are looking at a grid of products, it is very different on a desktop than it would be on a mobile phone or it would be on a tablet.

How does HSN split its mobile efforts between entertainment and commerce?
What we do is we bring it all together, so for us, HSN is an amazing place to shop, but I look at share of mind as a critical factor. Her time and her attention - that is the biggest luxury that women have. How do we convert that into share of wallet? And that?s what we do through creating one-of-a-kind and unique experiences that can include education, information, entertainment and fun.

We want her to come to HSN and experience HSN when she wants to shop, but also when she wants to be connected to the community. That?s a very unique proposition that our brand offers, and that is a key element of why mobile is growing as fast as it is.

As we look at marketing, we?re looking at relationship-building, and that?s the power of mobile. It?s so personal to her, and she?s connected to her mobile phone like no other tool. The transaction is obviously important, it?s a metric that we use, but we?re not just a transaction business; we?re a relationship-building business. Our customers engage with us on multiple platforms, and those are our most valuable customers.

Since transactions are not necessarily the end goal, what other metrics does HSN look at to gauge mobile?s success?
Obviously we are looking at time spent, we?re looking at click-throughs, we?re looking at conversions ? we bring all of the data together and marry it to customer profiles that are going to help us build that relationship.

What category she chooses to purchase from on mobile, even what tender choice and how she chooses to pay, any special offers that we?ve made all give us insight into her behavior and allow us to further customize future relationship opportunities.

Obviously we have a very large database, and I think what?s kind of interesting about mobile is that it?s new, it?s fast growing and it?s about learning. The value of mobile is that it helps us extend our storytelling, which is what we do really well. We?re about video commerce, and we?re about sharing stories, and when you can connect those stories to innovation that?s a pretty big win. Few people have the ability to tell stories and to do it in such an engaging way as we do.

The opportunity for mobile marketing with us is to utilize that advanced segmentation on the customer side, and it?s based on her profile. We can also track other devices that she?s using, how she?s ordering, and then it?s kind of that browse and cart history ? bringing all of that together is information and knowledge that we can then use to better customize future dealings with her.

Are you using any mobile-specific incentivizes or deals to get consumers on multiple platforms?
Absolutely, that?s the beauty of HSN, and it?s the unique value proposition that we offer. Whether it?s television, whether it?s video clips, no matter what platform it?s on, we want to build to that engagement, and we want to drive her from one to another.

So yes, it could be emails, it could be special offers. One of the things that?s really driving mobile is personalization. What we have is a tool we call favorites, and we?ve seen great success with this. It allows her to choose her favorite brand and then be alerted to that brand having new items, new products, new sales that she can then come and engage with. That alert is a critical component that allows her to personalize her preferences of how she wants to engage with us and how she wants us to communicate with her.

When we think about what success means in mobile marketing, our teams are focused on understanding the role of each mobile asset in the business and then how do we invest in each appropriately. So as we talk about discovery, mobile is a great way to attract new customers to the brand, but how do we further engage her and build that relationship?

It?s the marketing that gets her from a regular mobile customer to downloading our app ? that?s about getting her into a best customer position. If she?s able to engage with our app, we know there?s great value in that because it?s going to drive repeat purchases.

As a direct-to-consumer retailer, we have 36 years of history and building relationships. What?s really great is that mobile is another piece of her lifecycle that we can start to market to and learn from, so yes, it could be a great acquisition tool, but how do we get to that engagement level where she?s repeating purchases? That?s about Web, it?s about email, it?s about push, it?s about SMS and social. It?s weaving all of these things together like only HSN can do to build that long-term relationship.

What mobile trend coming down the pipeline is HSN most excited about?
I actually have four buckets. These are key for us and for retail globally.

The first is innovation, trying new initiatives ? it?s similar to the [HSN] favorites feature.

Personalization ? this is going to be key is that we want to be able to personalize her experience on mobile, and if that?s responsive graphics, if it?s about unique experiences that you can only get with us, that?s key.

[Third is] the social piece and integrating posts on different channels of what you purchase with HSN. We?ve done some Google hangouts that have done really well, but we?re really looking at social and that social integration as being key. Nothing can be siloed anymore, it must all be integrated.

We?re also excited about what we?re seeing and what we?re doing as pioneers in the gaming space, and gamification is a key strategy for us to build an even deeper relationship with our customer.

What will be the biggest challenge for marketers with mobile in the next few years?
It?s understanding the role of your mobile assets in your portfolio and doing that from a customer lifecycle perspective.

So the challenge is using the data and leveraging it to grow your business and understanding the difference between each platform is something that we are focused on as we continue to hit record levels of customer growth. We?re able to achieve that growth because we understand that each platform behaves differently and we customize the experience appropriately.

Final Take
Lauren Johnson is associate reporter on Mobile Marketer, New York